


the takeaway is this

by villiageidiot



Category: Glee
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-21
Updated: 2013-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-05 10:43:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1092947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/villiageidiot/pseuds/villiageidiot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The takeaway is this: Blaine Anderson can't find an inspiration.</p><p>(Or: the one wherein Kurt is a muse.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	the takeaway is this

_The New York Times_ says his work is transcendent. _Newsweek_ calls him innovative. At seventeen he’s number 57 on _People_ magazine’s Top 100 Bachelors list; his photos are on the covers of _TIME_ and _The New Yorker_ before he’s even old enough to legally vote.

Basically, he’s a child prodigy.

Or _was_ , really, because at the age of nineteen, he’s an almost _-_ has-been.

The takeaway is this: Blaine Anderson can’t find an inspiration.

:

It could be a depressing story, sure. A kid with amazing potential and unparalleled talent that grew up and sort of went nowhere as he faded from the public’s fascination almost as quickly as he skyrocketed into the spotlight. It’s not, though, because Blaine never gives up hope that tomorrow — maybe _tomorrow —_ he’ll see something beautiful again. He’ll find that one perfect shot, he just knows it.

He works hard to maintain that perpetual positivity, struggles everyday to not become jaded and bitter and cynical. And luckily for him, he has awesome friends that patiently support him and motivate him with positivity of their own.

“God _damn_ ,” his best friend tells him one night. “Get out of the house, Blaine. _Do_ something. It’s sad as hell to come home and always see you sitting on the couch.”

(Or, okay, maybe scratch that last part about the patient and positive friends.)

Blaine narrows his eyes. “Thanks, Artie.”

“And not sad in the _oh I feel bad for the poor guy_ kind of way but sad in the _shit I hope he showered today because ten bucks says he didn’t_ kind of way,” he clarifies.

He sighs. “I always shower. You’re exaggerating.”

Artie gives him a considering look. “Did you? Because I’ve got a hot blonde showing up in an hour and I don’t feel like explaining why the world’s saddest Macaulay Culkin is sitting in my living room.”

Blaine rolls his eyes. “Why is that your go-to insult? Everyone knows he made a comeback.”

Artie shakes his head and wheels towards his bedroom. “Sad, sad, sad,” he says to himself. “I need new _almost-still-famous_ friends.”

:

Blaine’s poking at some take-out Chinese a few days later when Artie comes home from work. He gives Blaine a blank stare.

“What?” Blaine says defensively. “I’m off the couch.”

“Look,” Artie tells him, “I don’t _actually_ want new friends. Most former child stars end up in rehab or lame celebrity reality TV —”

“I’m not a former child star, _”_ he interrupts. “Stop calling me that.”

“— so it’s cool. You make kickass food and don’t hit on my women.”

“Great,” Blaine says, still poking at his food. “You’re still my friend after all these years because I’m a gay chef. _Awesome_.”

He rolls his eyes. “Don’t pull the _oh woe is me_ crap again,” Artie says. “It’s tired and you’re better than that.”

Blaine pauses. “I know,” he says quietly.

“ _Do_ something,” he continues.

“It’s not that simple,” Blaine tells him.

“It _is_ ,” Artie argues. “You’re always complaining about how there’s nothing worth seeing anymore so _get out_ and find something that is. You’re sure as shit not going to find it in our apartment staring at a bowl of sweet and sour chicken.”

“I _do_ ,” Blaine says. “You know I do. I walk around this city everyday. I go to the zoo, I go to the park, I go _everywhere._ And there’s nothing beautiful, Artie. I can’t find anything anymore. There’s nothing striking, nothing inspiring.”

“Stop crying about it and keep looking,” Artie says.

Blaine sighs and pushes his Chinese away. “There’s _nothing_ beautiful out there. I’ve been trying to find it and it’s just … it’s not there. There’s either nothing beautiful anymore or…”

“Or?” Artie prompts, uncharacteristically patient.

He looks down at his hands. “Or maybe I just can’t see it anymore. What if I can’t see it anymore?”

“Stop crying about it and keep looking,” Artie says again. “And hook me up with your chicken if you’re done.”

He stares after Artie as he rolls into the living room, Blaine’s uneaten Chinese food in tow.

:

Blaine lies in bed that night and stares up at the ceiling. “Help me find something beautiful,” he says to no one in particular. “I just need to see something beautiful.”

And twelve hours later, sitting on a bench outside of a prestigious performing arts school, Blaine finally finds something striking and inspiring, finally sees something beautiful.

Or some _one_ beautiful, really.

: : :

_**Comedy.** _

Blaine’s sitting on a bench outside of one of the main buildings but he doesn’t go to NYADA so he has no idea which one nor does he really care. He doesn’t even know why he’s _at_ the school aside from the fact that he’s never been. It feels like he’s been everywhere in this lonely, cold, depressing city so he can’t imagine what a school full of snobby artsy kids could offer him but — well, it’s not like he has anything better to do.

So he’s sitting and sending a text to Artie when Blaine suddenly looks up. He has no idea why but he looks up. There’s no noise, no sudden movement, no reason at all that he should be looking up. But he does.

And there he is, the something beautiful that Blaine’s been looking for.

His mouth opens slightly. This guy — he’s stunning, he’s breathtaking, he’s otherworldly.

Blaine fumbles with his camera until he’s got the cap off and lens properly focused. He accidentally takes a few pictures without thinking, hands a little shaky. _This is it,_ this is his picture.

He waits a few seconds then starts taking a few more. And a few more. The guy starts walking and Blaine shifts on the bench, his shutter like rapid-fire, but pauses for a moment when a girl joins the man. She says something and he rolls his eyes then she turns to heads towards the building that the man, the _beautiful_ _man_ , just left.

Blaine holds his camera up, poised, as the guy stares after her. He smiles fondly then laughs. He tries to cover it, though, and holds the back of his hand over his mouth like maybe he could possibly hide it. He fails terribly and his eyes crinkle just the smallest bit — and Blaine takes a picture.

It’s _the_ picture, he knows it.

:

Blaine practically runs home then develops it in the darkroom immediately. He’s sort of dazed by the time Artie wheels in the door.

He eyes Blaine suspiciously. “What’s your deal?”

“I found it,” he answers, grinning. “I _found_ it.”

“Your picture?” Artie asks.

“Something beautiful,” Blaine says.

Artie quickly loses interest but Blaine’s too busy staring at the picture to notice.

Later, he hangs it back in the darkroom and titles it _Thalia._

: : :

_**Sacred Poetry.** _

Blaine’s back at the same bench the next day and he waits for a few hours before giving up. He’s back the day after that. And the next.

On the third day, Blaine’s almost caught off-guard when finally he sees him. Blaine leaves his bench, giving up to head home and half convinced he hallucinated the whole thing, when he passes through a small courtyard with a few stone tables set up. A few students are eating, some reading text books, some laughing with friends — but there _he_ is, at a table far away from all of the others and far away from Blaine, staring out into the distance.

Blaine’s breath catches and wonders what the guy is watching, what he sees. There’s a book open in front of him, pages slightly fluttering in the wind, but he’s not reading, just staring with a faraway, distracted look.

Somehow, he looks even more beautiful than Blaine remembered, more stunning than his photo could ever capture.

Blaine fumbles with his camera again then takes picture after picture until the guy snaps out of his gaze and looks back down towards his book.

Blaine rushes back to his dark room again, impatient to see what he’s captured and immortalized.

:

He’s staring at one of the pictures when Artie comes home. It’s the picture he hasn’t been able to tear his eyes away from, the picture of the beautiful man staring off into the distance looking completely oblivious to everything and everyone around him.

And while staring at the photo, caught up in every detail of the image, _Blaine’s_ sort of oblivious to everything and everyone around him so he startles when, out of nowhere, he hears Artie say, “Not bad.”

Blaine looks up, eyes wide. “Not _bad?_ Are you kidding me?”

Artie gives him a wary look. “No,” he says slowly. And then: “Why do you have crazy eyes right now?”

“Not _bad?”_ Blaine says again. “Are you not seeing what I’m seeing?”

Artie eyes him. “You want me to swoon? It’s good, Blaine, but you sort of have a lens flare thing going on over there,” he says, vaguely waving to the top of the photo.

When Blaine holds it up to see what the hell he’s talking about, Artie cocks his head and says, “Oh. _Damn_ , Blaine, that’s a legit picture.”

“What?” Blaine asks, confused.

“It’s like … he’s an angel,” Artie says, head still tilted.

Blaine looks up to Artie, semi-horrified. “ _What_?” he says again. “That might be the creepiest thing you’ve ever said.”

He rolls his eyes. “Breathe,” he says. “I’m talking about the halo vibe he’s got going on.”

Blaine looks back at the picture and sees that Artie’s right. There’s a faint glow all around the guy’s head. “He does,” Blaine whispers, eyes glued to the photo again. “God, he _does_.”

Artie stares at him for a few long minutes. “Yeah _I’m_ they creepy one,” he says, rolling away. “I’m not the one perving over a picture.”

Blaine ignores him, hangs it next to the other and titles it _Polyhymnia._

: : :

_**History** _ **.**

Blaine starts showing up to NYADA everyday and the man never gets less beautiful. It’s the opposite, actually, and it starts to drive Blaine a little insane. He’s not _perving_ over the man like Artie accuses but he’s slowly being consumed of the idea of him, of getting another perfect picture and another after that and then _another_ until the world runs out of film.

He’s walking aimlessly around the campus one afternoon, not even really looking for _him_ , but just trying to take it in, to _see_ it. He wonders if he’s been asleep for the past few years because suddenly, everything is bright again. _Alive_.

That’s when he hears him. Blaine _hears_ him and oh god, that voice. He’s talking to that same girl, both talking rapidly as if trying to compete for conversation. And seriously, _that voice._

Blaine takes a few steps away until he’s sort of half behind a tree then starts taking pictures. He’s not at a great angle but he takes them anyway just in case something stands out, just in case there’s another perfect picture to hang in that darkroom. He’s walking a little too fast for Blaine to properly focus the lens but he keeps going … just in case.

He doesn’t leave until the two of them have rounded the corner, until the guy is completely out of sight.

:

The picture is black and white and because Blaine wasn’t able to focus properly, it’s just a little blurred around the edges, a soft fade where there should be clear outlines.

“Very Gary Cooper,” Artie says. “But the early years before the skeevy sex scandals.”

Blaine has no idea who the hell he’s talking about but he doesn’t care because the picture is stunning. “He looks like a 1920s movie star,” Blaine says quietly.

Artie sadly shakes his head. “I know,” he sighs, clearly disappointed with his best friend. “Which is why I said it. You need some _culture,_ Blaine, because this is some basic shit. How are you even gay without knowing about classic retro iconic heartthrobs?”

He keeps talking but Blaine tunes him out and hangs up the photo.

“Even _I_ think he’s a little sexy,” Artie is still saying. “Whip out your phone, Google him—”

Blaine straightens it and can’t stop staring. He titles it _Clio_.

: : :

_**Dance.** _

And then they meet. It’s brief so even though Blaine has an internal panic attack, he manages to keep it together long enough to not come off as a totally neurotic nutcase.

Blaine’s sitting in the park eating some lunch with one of his friends from high school, occasionally taking a picture of a duck or a flower or of something that is most definitely not the beautiful man a few miles away probably in class. When they’re done and when the conversation fades into a comfortable silence, Tina jumps up suddenly and says, “It’s almost three o’clock!”

Blaine looks up at her, startled and a little confused. “Okay?”

“I have to go. He teaches class at three on Wednesdays and I sneak into the auditorium to watch him.”

“Who?” Blaine asks, totally not following.

“Mike,” she tells him. “Mike Chang, the dance teacher down at the community center. Blaine, you _have_ to come. His _abs,_ oh my god.”

He shrugs and follows her, flowers and ducks forgotten.

And when they sneak in and take seats in the back of the darkened auditorium to watch Mike Chang with the _amazing_ abs teach an intermediate dance class, Blaine quietly gasps when he sees who is _in_ the intermediate dance class.

He tunes Tina out and watches _him_ , Blaine’s _something beautiful._ He’s wearing something white and almost shimmery and even though Blaine watches him intently, Blaine still can’t figure out what material it is or why it makes him almost _shine_.

Blaine starts to take pictures. Thankfully, Tina is too engrossed with the dance instructor to notice.

The guy spins and bends and turns and _radiates._ Blaine can’t stop watching, can’t put the camera down.

When the class ends an hour later, Blaine stays in the back of the auditorium while Tina bravely walks up to the front to introduce herself. After Blaine sits in the back for five, ten, fifteen minutes, he decides it’s safe to leave her there to flirt with the dance instructor. As he makes his way out of the back doors, though, he runs directly into _him_.

Blaine’s eyes widen.

The guy gives him a small smile. “Oh. Hello.”

He swallows and manages a quiet, “Hello.”

He cocks his head. “Have we met? You look familiar somehow.”

“No,” Blaine answers, voice still soft. “We haven’t met.”

The guy keeps staring. “Are you sure? I can’t place it but —”

“No,” Blaine says again. “I would remember it.”

He smiles again. “Would you?”

Blaine feels his face heat up slightly.

“I’m Kurt,” the guy says. “And you are?”

“Blaine,” he answers, eyes focused on Kurt’s. Now that he’s up close, Blaine can clearly see his eyes but can’t quite place the color.

“Well, Blaine,” he says, “now we’ve met.”

Blaine swallows and nods. “Nice to meet you, Kurt.”

Kurt gives him another smile, almost shy. Before either of them can say anything, Tina comes rushing out of the auditorium and says, “He asked for my _number,_ Blaine. We’re going out on Friday. God, those _abs.”_

She tugs him along, totally oblivious. Blaine looks over his shoulder to maybe say goodbye to Kurt — the most beautiful guy Blaine will ever see in his life — but he’s already turned and walking away.

:

Blaine develops the film as soon as he gets home.

He stares at it — at _Kurt_ — in awe. There’s a shot of him in motion, mid-pirouette under the bright stage lights that make him glow. The colors swirl around him, trying to keep up as he spins.

His mouth falls open as he looks at it, stunned at the casual, focused expression on Kurt’s face that’s in stark contrast to the vivid display of color trailing behind him.

“Whoa,” Artie says when he glances at it. “That’s intense.”

Blaine nods, almost speechless. “Who _is_ this guy?” he wonders aloud. “And why can’t I get him out of my head?”

Artie shrugs. “Because you need a social life,” he says rolling towards the front door. “Have fun obsessing over it — _him_ — because we both know that’s how you’ll be spending your night. Which, depressing and _lame_ , Blaine.”

Blaine hangs the photo and cocks his head to see how it looks next to the others.

“Last chance,” Artie says. “Me, you, trendy uptown bar with lots of fine women.” As an afterthought: “And men, I’m sure. Hella sexy ones.”

But Blaine isn’t listening. He titles the photo _Terpsichore._

: : :

_**Music.** _

They meet again but this time it’s not an accident. This guy — Kurt — he’s driving Blaine slowly insane and since having no contact with him seems to be doing _nothing_ in terms of Blaine maintaining his sanity, he thinks that talking to him can’t possibly make it worse than it already is.

Which is how he finds himself at a stone table in the courtyard, waiting for Kurt to walk by after his evening classes. He doesn’t exactly know Kurt’s schedule since he’s not a creepy stalker but he knows enough for it to be just a little weird.

“Kurt,” he says a little breathlessly when he sees Kurt walk by.

Kurt looks startled for a moment before giving Blaine a small, pleased smile. “Hi. Blaine, was it?”

He nods.

Kurt watches him for a few moments. “Is there — did you want something?”

“Oh,” Blaine says, blinking. “No, I — hello. I just wanted to say hello.”

Kurt tilts his head. “Hello.” He doesn’t say anything else.

Blaine steels himself and tries not to be distracted by Kurt’s eyes, his hair, his smile. “Would you maybe want to go to dinner sometime? Or tonight?”

Kurt gives him an apologetic look. “I can’t. I’d love to but I can’t—”

“Right,” Blaine interrupts quickly, words rushing out. “I thought I would see just in case but — right, I understand.”

“— because I have rehearsal,” Kurt continues. “But I finish at eight, if you think you’ll still be hungry then?”

“Right,” Blaine says again, a little stunned. “Eight is perfect.”

Kurt gives him one last smile before walking away, leaving Blaine in the middle of the courtyard. He only waits a few minutes before following after Kurt to the large theater in the middle of campus. He sneaks into the back row of seats right below the lighting booth and just watches Kurt, listens to him sing. _God_ that voice. It makes his pulse quicken and stomach flutter. With that voice and those eyes and that smile, Blaine’s pretty sure that he would be helpless against Kurt, that he’d do anything Kurt asked. Blaine doesn’t even know him but he already feels utterly defenseless, already feels confident that he’d never know how to tell him _no_.

It’s intoxicating. He carefully, quietly removes his camera and takes a few pictures while Kurt sings about heartbreak and lost loves, face slightly flushed under the stage lights, hair just a little out of place as he moves across the stage. Blaine takes picture after picture.

:

He develops it as quickly again, aware that he has to meet Kurt back on campus in an hour.

The photo is off center, Kurt standing on the right-hand side of the stage. He looks powerful and controlled as he commands the entire stage. Blaine’s eyes rake over every inch, speechless at how passionate he looks and how empty the rest of the stage seems. Wherever Kurt _isn’t_ , it’s lonely and barren and unimportant. The photo almost looks bisected, a before-and-after photo, a then-and-now picture, an image of what something _is_ and what it _could be_.

Blaine places the photo on the living room coffee table and just stares at it, losing track of time.

Artie wheels into the room and glances between Blaine and the photo and then back to Blaine. “I could give you mad props for the use of negative space in your photo but I know you don’t actually care.”

“No,” Blaine admits. “Not really.”

“These are good,” Artie continues. “You’re finally bringing your A game.”

“It’s him,” Blaine says. “It’s _all_ him. These would be lifeless pictures without him, Artie. He makes them _alive_.”

Artie shrugs. “Fine, whatever. I’m just saying you should do something with them. Call your people, your museum posse.”

“I’ll think about it,” he tells Artie as he carefully takes the photo back to the darkroom to hang it next to the others.

He calls it _Euterpe._

: : :

_**Astronomy.** _

They meet on Tuesday nights at a tiny cafe off campus, one not too far from Blaine’s apartment.

One week, they talk about the present:

Kurt asks him what he does for a living, where he works since he never seems to be _at_ work. Blaine is flustered and can’t think of how to say _oh I’m living off money I made years ago when TIME magazine and The New Yorker bought my professional photos_ so instead he says, “Just a photographer. I take pictures.”

Kurt seems intrigued. “Really? Like artsy classy ones, or…”

“Weddings, birthdays,” Blaine lies. “Nothing too interesting.”

“Ah,” Kurt says with a teasing smile. “One day you could give me a discount on some head shots.”

Blaine’s smile falters but then recovers. “Free,” he says, voice just as teasing. “They would be free. Maybe in exchange for one of the head shots.”

Kurt looks surprised and pleased. “Oh. Well, I think that sounds like a good deal.”

Another week they talk about the future:

“I want to go places,” Blaine says. “See the world, feel the history of wherever I go.”

“I want to go places, too,” Kurt says. “Broadway specifically. I want to be a star, I want to shine and be _seen_.”

“You are,” Blaine says quietly. “You shine. People see you.”

Kurt gives him that same pleased smile.

Another week they talk about the past:

“I was eight,” Kurt says, playing with the lid to his coffee. “My dad and I, we were lonely for awhile but we at least had each other.”

“And then?” Blaine presses. He’s pretty sure he couldn’t ever get tired of hearing Kurt’s voice.

“A warm step-mother that really loves my dad. A step-brother that I know entirely too much about,” he says with a fond eye roll. “Including what he smells like after going three straight days without a shower or the noises he makes during intimate private moments that I should never have to know about.” He pauses. “You?”

“A brother I know entirely too little about,” Blaine answers with a crooked smile. He doesn’t say much else.

One week, Kurt’s waiting outside instead of at their corner back table. He’s leaning his side against the wall, hip pressed against the white brick, and a flickering street lamp occasionally bathing him in light. Behind him it’s nothing but the dark sky, only a few buildings off in the distance, barely visible in the skyline. The stars are like glitter above him, framing him with a shimmering glow.

His head is slightly turned as he watches something across the street so he doesn’t notice Blaine pulling out his camera and snapping a few quick pictures.

:

Blaine doesn’t even wait until the morning to head to his darkroom. When he finishes developing it, he tilts his head to take in the full effect. It’s mostly black-and white except for the pale yellow light that shines down from the flickering light and from just a few of the stars in the back that happened to catch the light when the flash went off.

And Kurt’s sweater, of course. A bright yellow that brings the attention back to what matters most in the photo.

“You’ve got it _bad_ ,” Artie says when he sees it, still awake for some reason.

“I know,” Blaine sighs, sadly. “I can’t stop thinking about him.”

Artie eyes him. “And you _are_ hooking people up with these, right? Your people, the ones that will make you a clutch photographer again? ”

Blaine doesn’t answer in favor of remembering that illuminating streetlight.

He names the photo _Urania_.

: : :

_**Epic Poetry.** _

Blaine thinks that finally being around Kurt will tone everything down, that he won’t feel so overwhelmed with what he feels when he sees Kurt. He figures out very quickly that he’s terribly wrong.

Things don’t get better; they get worse. Everything he feels just gets stronger, everything intensifies. Instead of being simply a beautiful man with a stunning voice, Kurt becomes a guy that Blaine wants — _needs_ — to be around. He wants to hear everything about Kurt’s life, he wants to tell Kurt everything about his own. Blaine wants the details, the specifics, the good and the bad and whatever is in between.

He wants _Kurt_. The way he looks, the way he sounds, the way he laughs. Blaine wants how honest Kurt is, how smart, how funny. He wants it all.

When he spends just five minutes with Kurt, Blaine has the urge to see the world, to look for the life in anything, everything. He feels more in those five minutes than he’s felt in the past two years combined. He feels alive. He thinks he could maybe be that photographer again, the one with a bright photo published on the cover _TIME_ magazine.

They eat lunch on campus every Thursday in between two of Kurt’s classes and it’s like a slow torture for Blaine. He wants to reach out and touch him, to prove to himself that Kurt actually exists and isn’t a figment of his overactive imagination because how is someone like Kurt Hummel even real? But he doesn’t, too worried that maybe Kurt would pull away if Blaine tried. The certainty that inevitably follows after Kurt pulling away, the definitive _no, he doesn’t want you back; he doesn’t feel what you feel_ — it’s terrifying to Blaine. He’d rather live not knowing if Kurt would pull away, with that potential possibility, because the alternative makes his chest ache. Just thinking about it makes his stomach swoop in entirely unpleasant ways.

And then one day.

One amazing life altering day:

“I don’t think you’ll ever ask to kiss me,” Kurt says softly as they sit in the park, back against their favorite tree. “So maybe you’re waiting for me to ask.”

Blaine’s mouth falls open slightly and he shifts to face Kurt. His heartbeat is too fast, his pulse is too quick, his breathing is too shallow.

“ _Are_ you waiting for me to ask?” Kurt says, sounding only a little unsure.

Blaine blinks and briefly can’t find the words. “I’ve wanted to kiss you since the very first time I saw you,” he admits. And Kurt doesn’t realize just how long that is, doesn’t know how long Blaine admired him from afar.

So they kiss. It’s life altering.

The next time they sit at their favorite tree, they’re not side-by-side. The next time they sit at their favorite tree, Kurt reads the _Odyssey_ for class and Blaine lies with his head resting comfortably on Kurt’s thigh. And that’s the way it stays, week after week. Some days Blaine reads, sometimes he listens to _Kurt_ quietly read, sometimes he people-watches. Most of the time time, though, he thinks. He thinks about where he’ll go, what he’ll capture on film when he goes there, and thinks of all the places he needs to see in his lifetime.

It’s the best part of Blaine’s week, the moments they sit at the tree. Even better than the kissing. (But only just barely.)

He’s never felt closer to another person, both physically and emotionally, but he’s also never felt as far away. No matter how much Kurt tells him and what they talk about, they have so much left to learn, so much more to hear and to say.

The way Kurt looks at him — it makes him invincible and unstoppable and appreciated and intense and a dozen other things that he can’t quite qualify.

Kurt is there early one day, already reading at their tree and waiting for Blaine to show up and join him. He looks … Blaine can’t even find the words. Relaxed, maybe. Open. Real.

Blaine can’t help it. He takes out his camera and takes as many photos as he can before worrying Kurt will look up and see him. He slips the camera back in his bag.

:

He stares at the photo after he develops it but for different reasons. Normally he’s breathless at the way Kurt looks, the stunning beauty of him. This time it’s longing. He wants that memory again, wants to recreate it. He wishes he could make people feel how he feels when he’s in that very moment.

Artie’s quiet when he sees it, oddly serious. “Tell me you called your people, Blaine. This needs to be somewhere. You need to get your Macaulay Culkin on and jumpstart an epic comeback.”

Blaine shrugs. “I’ll think about it.”

He hangs it up and titles it _Calliope._

: : :

_**Tragedy** _ **.**

They fight. Blaine’s miserable and for a few days that feel endless, his only inspiration is darkness. Wilting flowers, a lonely man by a small pond in a park, the dilapidated house on the corner of his street. He feels empty.

It’s over another guy on campus, over Blaine’s stupid insecurities.

“Do you know him?” Blaine asks quietly as he meets Kurt by one of the stone tables, right after watching them walk side-by-side all the way to the courtyard from one of the buildings further down the campus.

“Who?” Kurt says. Then he looks over his shoulder. “Oh, him. We dated. Years ago, really.”

Blaine swallows thickly. “A boyfriend.”

“A _former_ boyfriend,” Kurt corrects, voice hesitant like maybe he knows there’s something wrong even before Blaine can realize it himself.

“Do you have a lot of those?” he asks, voice still soft.

Kurt watches him carefully, confused. “A few.” He pauses then says, “What’s this about?”

Blaine shakes his head, frustrated because he doesn’t _know_ what it’s about, only that he suddenly feels uncomfortable and out-of-place.

How is he supposed to be with Kurt, this beautiful man with the stunning eyes, the guy that lights up a room just with his presence? How is he supposed to compete with the entire world for Kurt’s attention? More importantly, compete for his _heart_?

“I can’t do this,” he says, miserable. He needs to back away, to leave, to get out as fast as he can.

“Blaine?” Kurt asks, confused. “What does that mean?”

He shakes his head again. “I— I’ll call you,” he manages to say before turning on his heel to leave, to get out as fast he can.

“Blaine?” Kurt calls out, a little louder and a lot more confused.

Blaine doesn’t call him, though. Kurt doesn’t call him either.

Instead, Blaine walks to Kurt’s campus a few days later to see him, to talk face-to-face and try to take back everything he said and did. He hopes he didn’t ruin anything, ruin _them_ , and silently, desperately prays that he can undo the damage.

He finds Kurt before he gets to the campus, though. He’s sitting at the park but nowhere near the shade of their usual tree. Instead he’s sitting far away from everyone else, back by the flowers and the brightly colored shrubs that the city planted a few years ago at the edge of the park. Even though his eyes are downcast and staring at his hands, it’s easy to see Kurt’s face. He looks lonely and forlorn with a small dark shadow under his eyes.

Blaine’s startled by the starkness of it all.

He’s wearing black pants and a white shirt, dark boots with a dark vest. From a distance, his pale skin looks even paler in the bright sun. He’s a black-and-white figure in the middle of a brightly painted backdrop. He’s surrounded by reds and greens and oranges and looks terribly out-of-place; he looks _colorless._

Blaine takes a picture. Only one.

Then he heads towards the flowers and Kurt looks up when he’s only a few feet away.

“Hi,” Kurt says on an exhale, standing up and moving into Blaine’s personal space.

“I’m sorry,” Blaine apologizes immediately. “Sometimes I can’t think straight when I’m around you. I can’t see reason or basic logic and I’m sorry.”

Kurt blinks. “Okay,” he says, not even bothering to ask what the hell Blaine’s talking about even though he couldn’t possibly know since Blaine never bothered to explain.

“I worry sometimes,” Blaine continues. “I see you and I worry that you won’t last. That you’ll slip away and wind up somewhere else. _With_ someone else.”

Kurt stares at him, silent and confused.

“I worry about how I’ll compete with them, whoever they could be—”

“I’m in love with you,” Kurt says simply.

Blaine freezes.

“Did you not know that?” Kurt asks.

Blaine shakes his head but only slightly. He can’t move, can’t think.

Kurt tilts his head and watches Blaine carefully. “Oh. I thought it was fairly obvious,” he says. “But if it wasn’t, I can spell it out clearly for you.”

He swallows, still not sure how to move, to think, to talk.

“I’m in love with you,” Kurt repeats, spelling it out clearly for him. “There’s no competition and I won’t slip away.”

After a few long moments, Blaine says, “I’m in love with you, too.”

Kurt gives him a small smile. “I was hoping you were.”

It’s the end of the fight.

:

He sits in his darkroom later while Kurt’s in class and develops his one single photo and it’s just as heartbreaking as he thought it would be.

“Hells yes,” Artie says when he sees it. “That thing is _gold_ , Blaine. That’s what I’m talking about.”

Blaine hangs it in the middle of the others and takes a step back to see the whole picture. “You think so?”

“Damn straight I do,” he says. “That one is your center piece.”

Blaine cocks his head and stares at it, considering. It hurts to even look at it.

“Maybe,” he says, not paying attention to the words. He’s not planning to do anything with these photos so he’s not really sure what he means when he agrees that it’s the perfect focal point amidst the others. It’s not like he’ll be hanging them up or even showing them to another person, not outside of his best friend who’s kind of entitled to see Blaine like this, raw and open and inspired.

He names it _Melpomene._

: : :

_**Love Poetry.** _

Blaine is under the false impression that there’s no more beautiful image than Kurt sitting in an array of bright colors or at a stone table staring abstractly into the distance or lying under a shaded tree with eyes downcast and intent with a book settled on his lap.

He’s wrong.

The first time he sees Kurt lying on his stomach in Blaine’s bed, naked and asleep and wrapped in a deep red sheet, he realizes how wrong he was.

The image of it actually takes his breath away and for a few terrifying moments, he forgets how to inhale and exhale.

He grabs his camera and quietly takes a few pictures. Kurt’s tastefully covered — only his left arm exposed along with the graceful length of his neck and just enough of his upper back to clearly tell he’s naked below the sheet — so Blaine doesn’t really feel like some sort of creepy pervert.

It’s easily the most beautiful moment Blaine has ever tried to capture on film.

His camera is back in its case and away in a desk drawer by the time Kurt opens one bleary eye. He smiles and says, voice thick with sleep, “Come back to bed, Blaine.”

Blaine’s just as helpless at saying _no_ as he thought he’d be.

:

After Kurt leaves for class, Blaine heads to his darkroom to develop quite possibly the most amazing picture he’ll ever take.

He’s hanging it up, admiring Kurt’s arm, his neck, his back, when Artie rolls. “Hold up,” he says. “You’re shooting porn now?”

“It’s not porn,” Blaine argues, rolling his eyes. “It’s art.”

“ _Porn_ art, maybe,” Artie says.

Blaine hesitates. “Wait, do you think it’s a bad shot?”

He frowns. “I think that thing is _epic_ and people will swoon when they see your boyfriend. Hell, _I’m_ swooning.” He raises his eyebrow. “But I still think it’s porn art.”

Blaine gives him a quizzical look. “People? What people?”

“The people that turn out to see Blaine Anderson’s art museum comeback showing.”

Blaine gapes. “Comeback showing? Artie, what did you do?”

Artie doesn’t answer and just rolls away.

Blaine looks back at his latest photo, a sense of dread in his stomach. He titles it _Erato._

: : :

So suddenly, there’s a showing. It’s hyped up and the media even gets mildly involved, mostly photography magazine editors and art critics. Blaine tells Kurt he can’t meet up for their date — _it’s a last minute wedding,_ he says, _but we’re still on for dinner on Monday, I hope._

Kurt doesn’t mind and he doesn’t read anything into it. Why would he? He doesn’t know his boyfriend is a world-famous photographer that’s surreptitiously been taking pictures of him for several months now so he has no reason to think _oh I wonder if he actually canceled tonight so that he could attend the opening night of his new photography collection, the collection all about me and my private moments that no one should be seeing and that my boyfriend should definitely not be exploiting._

Blaine thinks that maybe if he can just get through this night, things will work out. Kurt will never have to know about Blaine’s comeback showing or how he’s the lone celebrity star that inspired it. Blaine can go back to taking pictures of normal things and Kurt will be none the wiser.

The logic is probably flawed but in the end, it doesn’t really matter.

Because Kurt shows up.

Halfway through the night, Blaine looks over to his wall and the nine pictures displayed prominently in varying sizes and positions. Kurt’s looking at it, coffee cup hanging loosely by his side and expression bewildered.

“Oh god,” Blaine says to himself. He can’t get to him fast enough.

Kurt’s looking up by the time Blaine reaches his side, quietly reading the names aloud. “Terpsichore,” he murmurs to himself. “Urania, Erato, Melpomene.”

“God, Kurt,” he says on an exhale. “I am _so_ sorry I didn’t say something.”

Kurt finally registers someone next to him. “Thalia?” he continues, still quietly talking to himself. “Blaine, these are Greek muses.” He looks up again and counts nine. “All of them. _All_ of the Greek muses. I don’t understand.”

Blaine looks pained. “I know. I — I couldn’t stop myself. From that first moment I saw you, I couldn’t stop.”

Kurt stares at him with wide eyes then looks yet again at the wall and sees the exhibit’s title. “ _Muse_ ,” he reads aloud. He glances back to Blaine. “What does that mean?”

He watches Kurt’s reaction, apologetic. “It’s you. I should have told you, I know that.”

Kurt seems momentarily speechless. “This is how you see me?”

“This is how I see you,” Blaine tells him quietly.

Kurt blinks and says nothing.

“I couldn’t see anything beautiful anymore,” he explains. “And then there you were and you were _everywhere_. Suddenly, everything seemed beautiful.”

“Blaine,” he whispers. “I don’t know what to say.”

He flinches. “Say you’ll forgive me for invading your privacy. Tell me that I didn’t ruin everything.”

Kurt huffs out a skeptical laugh. “You’re not serious, are you? You think you _ruined_ things?”

Blaine pauses. “I — yes. I didn’t? Even though I took your intimate private moments and made them … not intimate and private at all?”

Kurt glances up at the picture of him naked wrapped in a red sheet and his face turns a little pink. “Maybe some are a bit risque, true,” Kurt agrees. “But you turned me into art, Blaine. It’s not like you made it into pornography.”

Suddenly, the tension leaves his shoulders and Blaine exhales.

“You’re not mad,” he says aloud. “I can’t believe you’re not mad at me. Or even creeped out?”

Kurt smiles and takes a few steps closer walking right into Blaine’s personal space. “I’m not mad,” he confirms. “But let’s discuss the semi-nudes next time.”

Blaine blinks. “Next time?”

Kurt tilts his head and gives him a curious look. “There won’t be a next time?” he asks, sounding marginally disappointed. “I don’t still inspire you?”

“Of course you still inspire me,” he says, swallowing thickly. “You’re still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Your muse,” Kurt says, trying to keep his voice light like maybe he thinks Blaine doesn’t see him that way anymore.

“My muse,” Blaine agrees quietly.

: : :

 _The New York Times_ says his work is inspired. _Newsweek_ calls him inspired. _TIME_ says his visions are inspired. _The New Yorker_ says — well, it’s probably pretty obvious what they say.

At twenty-five, he’s officially no longer eligible for _People_ magazine’s list of Top 100 Bachelors now that he doesn’t meet their sole requirement.

The takeaway is this: Blaine finally finds something beautiful.


End file.
